University of Michigan professor and Frenchman Gerard Mourou won a Nobel Prize in Physics on Tuesday for work with lasers. (Photo: Getty Images)
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Month: October 2018
(CNN) — Scientists believe a fossil found at a landfill in California belongs to an extinct species of whale that lived between 4 and 7 million years ago.
The seven-ton fossil was unearthed in June during a construction excavation at the Prima Deshecha landfill in San Juan Capistrano, Orange County Waste & Recycling announced in a statement.
A paleontologist with Paleo Solutions Lab, a company employed by the County of Orange —paleontologists must monitor construction excavations under California law — was working at the site when a large bone was spotted.
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The field of epigenetics sits precariously on the precipice of the classic nature versus nurture debate. Instead of a simple environment versus genetics dichotomy, epigenetic examines how specific genes are either switched on or off through external forces encountered in a person’s lifetime. Striking new research from scientists at the University of British Columbia and Harvard University is suggesting that adults who were victims of abuse as children may carry an imprint of that trauma in regions of their DNA.
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The Centre for the Study of Existential Risk’s (CSER) special issue Futures of Research in Catastrophic and Existential Risk was recently published. CSER is an interdisciplinary research centre within the University of Cambridge dedicated to the study and mitigation of risks that could lead to human extinction or civilisational collapse.
The special issue, edited by CSER postdoc Dr Adrian Currie, brings together a wide range of research on existential and catastrophic risk. This research is increasingly multi-disciplinary and broad in scope. It considers how existential risk is conceptualized as well as challenges in communication, responsibility and epistemology. Many of the fifteen papers collected here were originally presented at our first Cambridge Conference on Catastrophic Risk in 2016.
Contents:
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The universe is filled with uncountable amounts of mystery, discovery, opportunity, experiences, marvels and more. So, let’s not die if we don’t have to.
It’s much harder to make the case that radical longevity cannot be engineered into our biology than that it can. Humanity engineers cells in countless ways all the time now, and our knowledge, capability and tools keep growing exponentially.
Now, a mainstream amount of demand to create a bustling global industry of life extension R&D is the only thing standing between you and the ability to live indefinitely.” — Eric Schulke
Fifteen thousand years worth of Netflix are watched every day. Fifteen billion dollars are spent on the Super Bowl and fifteen billion dollars are spent on Valentine’s day. Those aren’t bad things but we need some perspective. Survival is humanity’s main and oldest occupation. We have what it takes to survive if we pay attention and get with the program.
“Yes, the future is transhumanism. Who would ask ‘Is the future being alive and prosperous?’ As if anyone should expect humanity to work for a future of hardship and death.” — Ray Keyes
People suffer in great existential voids these decades, not only do they need life, they need deep meaning and purpose. The movement for indefinite life extension is giving them both.
